Interview with Tom Weston, Author of Fission

Tom Weston is the author of the award-winning young adult novel First Night, and its sequel The Elf of Luxembourg was published in 2010. He is also the author of the historical novel, Fission.

Born in England, Tom now resides in Boston, Massachusetts. For more information, visit him at http://www.tom-weston.com/

Tell us a bit about yourself.

I was born in England, but I’ve lived in the USA for almost 30 years, most of those in Boston, Massachusetts. Before turning my hand to fiction, I had a successful career as the CEO of a consulting company, a conference speaker, and writer of industry articles and business books. But determining that the business world lacked a sense of humor, I decided to hand in the jacket and tie and instead turned to the world of literature. My works include the fantasy-based Alex and Jackie Adventures, and the collection of short stories, Tales from the Green Dragon Tavern.

What made you first decide to become a writer?

I had run a consulting company for the longest time; and a great deal of that was speaking and writing. I had always dabbled with writing, but my first encounter with it professionally was then –speeches, business articles, and books for the industry. It was quite successful, enough to finance what I’m doing now, but when an opportunity came to spend some time in Luxembourg, I handed the reins of the company to someone else. It was supposed to be just a sabbatical, but I never went back.

Can you tell us about your latest book?

Fission is based on the true story of scientist Lise Meitner, who was born in Vienna in 1878 and who died in 1968. That’s a fairly long period to cover – 90 years – so I ignored her childhood and pick up the story in 1906. That way I only had to do 62 of the more interesting years. The story is full of many famous people from that period: Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr, Max Planck, Werner Heisenberg, Adolph Hitler, Eleanor Roosevelt, President Truman, and Kaiser Wilhelm II, to name a few – and of course, Lise Meitner, perhaps the least famous but most important as far as our story is concerned.

Funnily enough, as my latest work, Fission was also my first. I originally wrote it as a screenplay, and although I’m still waiting for Spielberg to return my call, it did get a good enough reception to encourage me to write more. I put Fission on the shelf for a while and turned to other works – First Night and The Elf of Luxembourg and the short animation, There be Monsters! But I couldn’t just abandon Fission – it’s far too important – and now with two novels under my belt, I decided to rework Fission as a novel.

Article Author: Cheryl C. Malandrinos

Cheryl Malandrinos is a book reviewer, blogger, freelance writer and editor. Her first children's book, Little Shepherd, was published by Guardian Angel Publishing in 2010. She is also a member of the SCBWI. Ms. Malandrinos lives in Western Massachusetts with her husband and two children. …

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